Free Dark Horse by Tami Hoag

farms in East Buttcrack, hanging on the fringes of the big stables, hoping to pick up a real client or two. There were dealers like Van Zandt: hyenas prowling the water hole, in search of vulnerable prey. The lush life has many shades of gray beneath the gold leaf. It was now officially my job to dig up some of those darker veins.
    I thought it would be best to put in as much time as possible near the Jade stable before someone attached to Don Jade went into the bathroom with a copy of
Sidelines
and came out with a revelation. I’d spent enough time working undercover as a narc to know the chances of that were small, but there nonetheless. People see what they’re programmed to see, they seldom look for anything else. Still, a cop’s life undercover is never without the fear of being made. It can happen any second, and the deeper under, the worse the timing.
    My strategy working undercover had always been to get as much information as possible, as fast as possible; to sketch my illusion boldly and quickly. Dazzle the mark, draw them in close, then hit with the sucker punch and get out. My superiors in the Sheriff’s Office had frowned on my methods because I’d borrowed my style from con artists rather than cops. But they had seldom frowned on the outcome.
    Sean’s parking pass still hanging from my rearview mirror, I rolled past the guard at the gatehouse and into the maelstrom of the Wellington show grounds day shift. There were horses everywhere, people everywhere, cars everywhere, golf carts everywhere. A show was under way and would run through Sunday. Horses and ponies would be jumping over fences in half a dozen competition rings. The chaos would work in my favor, like running a game of three-card monte on a corner in Times Square. Difficult to keep your eye on the queen when you’re in the middle of a circus.
    I parked in the second lot, cut past the permanent barns and the vet clinic, bypassed the concession stands, and found myself on the show grounds’ version of Fifth Avenue: a row of mobile tack shops and pricey boutiques in tricked-out fifth-wheel trailers. Custom jewelers, custom tailors, antiques dealers, monogramming shops, cappuccino stands. I hit a couple of the boutiques to pick up trappings for my role as dilettante. Image is everything.
    I purchased and put on a wide-brimmed straw hat trimmed with black grosgrain ribbon. Men never take seriously a woman in a hat. I chose a couple of silk blouses and long wraparound skirts made from vintage saris. I made sure the clerks went overboard with the tissue paper, making the shopping bags look full to bursting. I bought some impractical sandals and trendy bracelets, and put them on. When I thought I looked frivolous enough, I went in search of Don Jade.
    There was no sign of him or of Paris Montgomery at his stalls. An underfed Guatemalan man was mucking out a stall, head down, trying not to attract attention lest the next stranger be an INS agent. The front of another stall had been removed to create a grooming bay. In it an overfed girl in a too-revealing tank top was grudgingly brushing a dappled gray horse. The girl had the mean, narrow eyes of someone who blames everyone but herself for the shortfalls in her life. I caught her looking at me sideways, her expression sour.
    I tipped my head back and regarded her from under the brim of the ridiculous hat. “I’m looking for Paris. Is she around?”
    “She’s riding Park Lane in the schooling ring.”
    “Is Don with her?” Don, my old pal.
    “Yeah.” And did I want to make something of it?
    “And you are . . . ?”
    She looked surprised I would bother to ask, then suspicious, then determined she would take advantage of the opportunity. “Jill Morone. I’m Mr. Jade’s head groom.”
    She was Mr. Jade’s only groom by the look of it, and by the anemic way she was wielding that brush, she defined the position loosely.
    “Really? Then you must know Erin Seabright.”
    The girl’s reactions